24 January 2002SINGAPORE - With the merger of the corporate travel arms
of Anglo-French Travel (AFT) and Ken-Air Travel Services
last month, industry sources say AFT is one of the parties
working on acquiring Ken-Air's leisure division.
"There have been quite a number of interested parties
and Anglo-French is one of them," said one observor. "The
fact that they (Ken-Air) are talking to potential buyers
can be seen in two ways: the owners may want to get out of
the business or want somebody else to run it."
Last month's merger of the corporate travel arms of both
agencies - the new entity has not been named - has brought
together about 100 staff. In recession-hit Singapore, where
the government has been warning of more layoffs at least
for the first half of the year, some staff may be asked to
go.
"In an M&A (merger & acquisition), in the "A"
part, there'll be some attrition.
"The corporate travel side deal was an "M" but this (the
rumoured acquisition) is an "A", said a source.
In times like this, there will always be a shakeout and
it's sad it has to happen to a very popular name," said the
source.
At presstime, both AFT chairman Lee Liat Cheng and
Ken-Air's chief operating officer Buck Low could not be
contacted for comment.